Hearing the tumult in the kitchen, Coucou Peter immediately returned; and what was his surprise when Mother Jacob, leading him to the little window, pointed out Mathéus to him, and related the miracle which the good man had worked!
He was on the point of bursting into a boisterous fit of laughter; but suddenly he pressed his sides and drew in his cheeks.
“Ah!” he cried, “is it possible? That’s what I saw, then!”
The neighbours all pressed about him and inquired what he had seen. Then Coucou Peter gravely related that, having passed by the kitchen-door, he had seen a white form—a sort of angel—turning a spit.
“I saw it as plainly as I see you,” he said to Mother Jacob.
And the good women all looked at one another in mute astonishment. Not one of them had courage to answer a word; they stole out on tiptoe without making the least noise, and news of the miracle quickly spread throughout Haslach.
When the time arrived for serving up the dinner, Mother Jacob hardly thought herself worthy to touch the lid of one of the saucepans; every moment she turned her head, fancying the angel was behind her, and her two servants were equally flurried.
In this manner Coucou Peter, for the sake of insuring the triumph of the doctrine, deceived the whole town of Haslach, and precipitated the illustrious Doctor Frantz Mathéus, his master, into a new series of extraordinary and marvellous adventures.